A Veszprém Megyei Múzeumok Közleményei 15. – Történelem (Veszprém, 1980)

Bácskay Erzsébet–Vörös István: Újabb ásatások a Sümeg-mogyorósdombi őskori kovabányában

NEW EXCAVATIONS IN THE PREHISTORIC FLINT MINE AT SÜMEG-MOGYORÖSDOMB In addition to a short review of exploitation conditions this paper deals first of all with the mining implements found in the flint mine at Sümeg-Mogyorósdomb during the excavations made by the Hungarian Geological Institute. They were: older test excavations (trial trenches) in the second half of the sixties and in the beginning of the seventies and systematic excavations between 1976 and 1978, respectively. (The location of the different excavation areas are shown on Fig. 1). With the aid of the trial trenches we could determine the place of several mining galleries. During our recent work between 1976 and 1978 a gallery was opened up in the Northern part of the mining area, while at the Southern part of it detail of a gallery together with a near-surface passage leading down to it was unearthed. At the Southern end of the 320 m long and 60 m wide mining area we found the boundary of ground breaking. We can realize that the mining activity was stopped along the line where the almost vertical calcareous marl layers, from which the flint was easily exploitable, were followed by horizontal layers from which the extraction of the flint nodules would have been very difficult. Moreover, we observed that in the region the flint was not of the same quality, i.e. suitable for making implements, therefore the distribution of galleries is not equal over the mining area. As for the characteristics of mining operations determined by the geological conditions and of the infilling of mining galleries, our excavations did not yield any fundamentally new results in comparison to the observations of László Vértes. In the infilling of the galleries we found 685 pieces of extraneous - mostly quartzite - ovairectangular shaped, discoid and spherical pebbles. On the basis of the traces of use and fractures observable on them we can prove, that 157 pieces were used first of all for the pounding of calcareous marl blocks already disengaged from the walls of the galleries by antler implements and for the removal of smaller marl pieces and marl-crust remained still on the flint nodules. We suppose that certain large and heavy pebbles were used as hammerstones and others as wedges. In addition, a roughly shaped basalt hammer and an andésite axe with a shaft-hole belong to the stone implements found in the mine. The other large group of mining implements consists of 165 tools made of the antler of the red deer. They are mauls, expanding-levering tools, wedges, picks or composite tools the well-known types usually found in prehistoric flint mines. There are also three pieces with shaft-holes, one of them is a hammer-head, the others are the fragments of so-called "antler-hoes". The parts of antlers used for the different types of implements are summarized in a Table. The mining operations made in the Sümeg flint mine can be reconstructed as follows: after removal of the covering soil (made probably by some light antler implement) the miners loosened the calcareous marl blocks by other types of antler tools (by all means with the aid of expanding-levering tools, wedges, picks and maybe together with the knocking of the calcareous marl sheets with mauls). Finally they disengaged the nodules of flint from the blocks with pebbles. The archeozoological analysis of the animal bone material found in the mine, namely the specific distribution of it, as well as the anatomical distribution of different bones within the species (the dominance of red deer and that of the antlers of red deer, see Table 1.) reflect well the character of the site (i.e. mine). This character is emphasized by Table 3 representing the frequency of utilization of different antlerregions (see Table 2) at Sümeg as compared to that observed in a primarily agricultural site of roughly the same age (Aszód-Papiföldek). It is clear from the comparison that at Sümeg antlers were used for specific mining implements. Because of the rather homogeneous infilling of the galleries as well as of the fairly uniform character of implements momentarily we cannot determine any inner periodization in the mine. The investigation of the distribution of raw material exploited in the mine is in progress. Up to know we have not found in the mine or in its surroundings any traces of settlement or working place, but part of the small, angular flint splitters found in the infilling of the galleries can be regarded as the waste of a certain restricted - local preparation of flint (remains of pounding). The C, 4 age determination (2720 ±160 ВС) of a charcoal sample collected by László Vértes and the presence of a bone-fragment of a horse together with two typical aegagrus domestic goats found during the excavations of the Geological Institute set the possible beginning of mining to the Middle Neolithic and the exploitation at the locality was practized still during Middle Copper Age, too. Author's address: Erzsébet Bácskay MÂFI H-l 143 Budapest Népstadion út 14. István Vörös MNM Régészeti Osztály H-l088 Budapest Múzeum krt. 14-16. 47 .